Operation: Sheathed Dagger
' Operation: Sheathed Dagger' was an exercise carried out off the west coast of Australia by New Commonwealth naval forces. It involved the testing of the captured Indonesian Tango-class submarine [[The Nuku Incident|KRI Nuku]]'' seized by Australian forces after ran aground on an Australian island in 1983. Operation Requirements The purpose of the exercise was to test the capabilities of the Tango-class against New Commonwealth defences. To that end the KRI ''Nuru, renamed HMAS Defector prior to the start of the exercise, fought a series of simulated battles against a variety of vessels and aircraft from across the New Commonwealth. The operation was to be carried out between January 12th and February 2nd 1984 (almost a year exactly from the day the Nuru ran aground). In the months leading up to the exercise a hand picked crew trained on operating the Defector. ''The crew came predominantly from Australia but also included sailors from the Commonwealth nations of New Zealand, the Uk, Canada and one sailor from Ghana. Notably, the Executive Officer was Lieutenant Commander Alec Winters of the Royal Navy. Winters would later command the Oberon-class HMS ''Onyx ''which sank the Soviet carrier [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_aircraft_carrier_Novorossiysk ''Novorossiysk] during the '91 Disaster. In his autobiography published in 2003 Winters described the crew of the Defector ''as ''"...the hardest drilled crew in the history of the New Commonwealth." The 'Opposition' A total of nine surface vessels took part in the operation acting as the defending forces. They came from four Commonwealth nations. As is standard practice for Commonwealth forces in times of war the local Commonwealth power assumed command responsibility which in this case was Australia. They comprised of; Australia *HMAS'' Adelaide'' *HMAS Sydney '' *HMAS ''Vendetta New Zealand *HMNZS Auckland *HMNZS Wellington United Kingdom *HMS Manchester *HMS Brilliant South Africa *HMSAS Amatola Singapore *HMSiS Steadfast Submarines Supporting these warships were two Australian submarines; *HMAS Titania *HMAS Rankin Aircraft Along with naval elements the Nimord MR.52s of the Royal Australian Air Force No.92 Wing were also used to hunt the Defector. Results The results of the operation sent shockwaves around New Commonwealth naval circles. While HMAS Defector '' was repeatedly "destroyed" during the exercises the Tango-class was not as poor a performer as was previously suspected by New Commonwealth intelligence circles. In almost 70% of the simulated engagements the Commonwealth fleet took losses before the single Tango-class was hit. In 5% of the engagements the submarine managed to "sink" Commonwealth ships and escape destruction. As the operation progressed the forces hunting the ''Defector ''adapted their tactics and by the end of the operation they had become quite adept fighting the Tango-class although even then the crew of the ''Defector ''were still scoring "hits" on the surface fleet. Political Fall-out In Australia the exercise results were used by the opposition party to criticize Bob Hawke's ruling party and their defence policies claiming that Hawke's party was ''"...gambling with Australian soveriegnty at sea." ''Hawke retorted such claims however when he said that the very purpose of the exercise was to adapt naval tactics to combat the threat. Criticism Sheathed Dagger was heavily criticized by many analysts the world over. The main argument was that the crew did not represent the average Indonesian or even Soviet crew of a Tango-class submarine. A British journalist for a naval magazine wrote; ''"The exercise results demonstrate that a highly trained and experienced crew who know the region they are operating in and even when utilizing an inferior class of conventional submarine is still a powerful force to be reckoned with. Commonwealth submarine crews have a formidable reputation the world over as the best, this reputation having been cemented by the recent fightng in the South Atlantic, so it would not be appropriate to compare the results of such a crew to that of an Indonesian or Soviet one. The exercise therefore does not represent how a hostile Tango-class submarine would behave in actual combat. If any further proof were needed that Indonesian crews were inferior to Commonwealth crews then we need only look at how the Australians acquired Her Majesty's Australian Ship Defector in the first place." These criticisms would prove warranted over six years later during the '91 Disaster when Indonesian crews proved woefully inferior to Commonwealth ones.'' '' Category:Exercises Category:Misc Category:Naval Exercises Category:Naval Operations